Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-10-29

| AA1A4NNN''N
the easy victim Of the thoughtful
and cunning operator, and an area suf-
ficient for the population of London was
sold in this locality, where, at the very best,
it was unreasonable to suppose that COM
mercial population exceeding 100000
would be located in half a century. The
city Of Buffalo, \. Y, is another example
in point For ten miles in every direc-
ton surrounding the city of Buffalo, the
| country was divided into blocks, lots,
streets, alleys and public squares. The
construction Of the Erie Canal, the navi-
gabiIity of Lake Erie, the vast commerce
to flow from the West and the Northwest
to the Atlantic seaboard it was assumed
would focus itself at Buffalo. Upon that
theory farming land was sold at town-site
valuations. Land which fifty years ago at
Buffalo would have brought s., 600 an acre,
can be had to-day for 800 an acre. The rea-
for this is obvious. The permanency of
the value Of real estate is dependent en-
tircly upon the use it may be put to- The
land was not demanded for town property
purposes, and it therefore passed back into
the category of lands whose values are de-
| pendent upon agricultural uses. In the
case Of the city Of Kcokuk, the standard of
twenty inhabitants to the acre is perfectly
maintained, as it is in 90 per cent. OF the
cities of the country. The exceptions re-
late largely 10 suburban cities where indi-
viduals will use from one to five acres of
ground, but even in these suburban in
stances town-site valuations are not main
tanned. At their inception, land will
sell from $1,000 to $4,000 an acre, but
later it recedes to Il point but little above
its agricultural value. Throughout the
Western States, notably in Illinois, Iowa.
Minnesota and Wisconsin, a very large
number of cities were plated and their
lots sold. We have in mind an instance at
the junction of the Iowa with the Missis-
into town lots were sold at TOWNSHIP valua-
tons to Eastern spectators. The shrewd
owner Of the land very soon re-acquired his
| property by tax titles, and not one single
/ house of the twenty or thirty built for
speculative purposes remains standing to-
day. Within the past twenty years in
! California its entire railroad system has
been constructed. Upon its lines every
where villages have been established. Us
ually at their inception larger area of
town lots were sold than was subsequently,
found to be in accordance with the demand,
as determined by the future growth of the
place. Sooner or later the area of TOWNSHIP
valuations was reduced to 4 normal rela-
ton between village populations and the
value of land for village purposes. The
surplus over the amount thus demanded has
never retained its value for townsite pur-
poses over period of ten years, but is
naturally and inevitably forced back to
the value justified by its highest use as
fruit or farming land. In short, that area
in excess of twenty Inhabitants to the
acre returned to its proper condition as
agricultural land, and has that use to-day
in every instance. The most unac-
countable imbecility connected with
these ventures has been the
countenancing of the imitation
of values by the commercial classes of
these cities. They have somehow held
vaguely to the illusion that the value of !
outside property has S ome natural relation
to the growth of the town-that is to say, |
the merchant with goods to sell has been
almost uniformly deluded into the belief |
that high valuation upon unoccupied
real estate of town site is conducive to the
growth of trade. This is the exact re-
verse OF the truth. The growth of trade,
being direct cause of the increase of
population, is the Indirect cause of the in
crease of property values, but the arbi-
trarily high value placed upon outside or
unoccupied property has no possible bear
ing upon the increase of trade. Our
Southern California contemp oraries resent,
with an Immature and nervousness refer
able only to the weakness of their position
any attempt to show the grotesque alb
surdity Of the valuations placed upon the
immense areas which have been laid out
in town lots in Los Angeles and San Diego
They do this because in large
their proprietors are interested in
a speculative way in that class of property,
and further, because their advertisers are
real estate brokers, who are not actual and
spectators in these values
but the actual growth of the country in
which they pretend to feel so deep an in
terest is not promoted by this absurd in
Hation---it is in fact retarded However
great the prospective growth ola city, the
value of the property to come into de-
mand by that growth and expansion may
De anticipated to such an extent that inter
st and taxes will overbalance enhance
ment. The unwary are entrapped into
the purchase of lands contiguous to a city,
and possibly necessary to its future expan-
sion, at such high rates that they cannot
afford to sell at anything like that rate
which the growth of the city would es-
tablish. Herein an obstacle is presented
to the growth. Property cannot be had at
Il reasonable valuation for commercial pur-
poses. 1t has attained already full
growth and development of value. 1t has
passed into the hands OF nervous and Vi
sionary spectators. 1t has passed from
the hands of the wise to those of the fool
ish. When a boom in real estate collapses
the fabric usually comes down on the
heads Of the uniformed; men of unframed
judgment, men who have taken money out
Of mercantile pursuits, and who are car
ried away by the excitement of the hours
have invested in wild speculative schemes.
California is on the eve of most phenom-
email growth, exceeding that of any other
American State at any time. 1t possesses
mo very remarkable advaptaua ovar ,,x-